Here in Louisiana, Republicans are doing everything they can in a tight race to unseat an incumbent Democrat member of the Senate, Mary Landrieu.

A Republican contender who has since dropped out of the race filed a lawsuit claiming that Senator Mary Landrieu should be disqualified since she does not own a home in Louisiana and lives in Washington most of the time. You know, because since she works there, that somehow disqualifies her from representing her home state.

Republican state Rep. Paul Hollis filed the suit, presumably on the behest of the Republican Party in order to remove Mary Landrieu from the race which currently pits a couple of Republican candidates against the three-term moderate senator from Louisiana.

Since Louisiana has what is known as a “jungle primary” that pits the top two winners of a runoff election in a general election, it is currently assumed that Mary Landrieu will face off against Congressman Bill Cassidy who only has one serious challenger. That threat comes from Rob Maness, a retired Air Force colonel who is the Tea Party candidate, and has also been endorsed by Sarah Palin and Phil Robertson from the reality show Duck Dynasty.

A state judge in Louisiana has thrown out a challenge to U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu’s qualification to run for re-election in Louisiana. District Judge Wilson Fields ruled Friday that Republican state Rep. Paul Hollis’ lawsuit claiming the three-term Democratic senator lives in Washington and not Louisiana was premature.

Fields says the U.S. Constitution is clear a senator must be a resident of the state from which he or she is elected at the time of the election.

Fields says a challenge could be filed only after the election, which is set for Nov. 4.

Landrieu says she lives with her parents in New Orleans when in Louisiana, and is registered to vote in Louisiana. Hollis claimed Landrieu is a “full-time, permanent inhabitant” of Washington, D.C., where she owns a home. (Source)

Unlike many other southern states, Louisiana actually has a Democrat representing it in the United States Senate. While Mary Landrieu is more of a conservative than most other Democratic senators, she is still better than any of the other Republicans who want to take her seat.

Senator Landrieu is currently the Chair of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, chair of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security and a member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs and Small Business and Entrepreneurship committees. (Source)

Louisiana is one of the states shut out of the Medicaid expansion which was part of the landmark Affordable Care Act, also known as “Obamacare.” It was blocked by Governor Bobby Jindal, a long shot Republican presidential candidate in 2016.

Jindal called the health care plan a “blow to our freedoms” and said the “president forced this law on us.”

“It really raises the question of what’s next, what’s allowable,” Jindal said on a Republican National Committee Conference Call. “Taxes on people who refuse to eat tofu or refuse to drive a Chevy Volt…this whole ruling I think is ridiculous. It’s a huge expansion of federal power.”

Jindal said despite the law being upheld, Louisiana will “not set up an exchange.” (Source)

Bill Cassidy and Rob Maness are both running in opposition to the Affordable Care Act, something Bill Cassidy has promised to “repeal and replace” should he be elected to the Senate. In fact, Bill Cassidy has proudly announced his endorsement by Dr. Ben Carson, a Tea Party hero who has compared the Obama administration to Hitler’s Germany.

This fall’s mid-term election is going to be very, very close. Nate Silver gives the Republicans a good chance of taking the Senate and retaining the House as well. While Mary Landrieu is no Elizabeth Warren or other progressive hero, she may be the only thing that stands between a Democrat-controlled Senate and a Republican-controlled Senate. Please consider giving her your support.

Comments

Funny, there is exact same case in Kansas, only this old fart is Republican who lives in Koch bros’ rent-for-free houses in affluent suburbia of Wichita. He is still serving in the Congress without Republicans bat eyes on this one.

Double standard hypo-friggin-crites.

Stephen Barlow

If Louisiana is ignorant enough to elect Bobby Jindal twice, why should be even CONSIDER them people?

Mary’s big question to Cassidy should be:
“Replace it with WHAT? EXACTLY WHAT? In detail! What are you going to replace 10,000 pages of healthcare reform THAT IS WORKING IN ALL 50 STATES with?

YOu better pull some details out of you no sunshine place because if you have NOTHING OF substance to offer the People of Louisiana you are praying to represent, then you are not WORTHY of representing then with your empty promises of ‘Repeal and replace”. All you have for Louisiana is BUZZWORDS and flimflam double talk.”

Nemisis

ACA is working and doing great in all states that have exchanges. In states like mine where the state government enacted laws that hinder it it is not doing so well. My state government is very proud that it is doing poor. We even have some dipshit using that as his platform.
“Look at how prices increased….”
It makes me want to slap every damn vote along to get along idiot in the head that bitches about the ACA and how much our medicare/medicaid went up along with private insurance. Not one of them mentions how the idiot they voted for refused to accept the expansions or set up an exchange.

Stephen Barlow

In Oregon, they closed the state exchange because it malfunctioned, but the program did very well for the people.

There is a difference between a Texas or Oklahoma who SABOTAGES the PPACA and the PPACA doing badly on it’s own. NOWHERE that it was NOT sabotaged is it doing badly.

I believe 6 RED states are rethinking expanding medicaid AHEAD of the 2016 elections. I bet you there will only be one or two whose voters are too stupid to defeat a Red Governor bent on keeping them sick by 2020. I am thinking Mississippi and Louisiana. Maybe South Carolina too.